California environmental group advocates drilling to reduce oil pollution on local beaches

In 1969, a Union Oil rig off the coast of Santa Barbara experienced a blowout. Pipes burst, and oil spilled into the sea -- as much as 100,000 barrels worth. The resultant oil slick so horrified local residents that Earth Day was born. Soon thereafter, the first of a series of laws banning offshore drilling was enacted.

The chance of another spill, locals reasoned, just wasn't worth drilling. And despite four decades of progress in eliminating such accidents, the ban has stood. Yet, local beaches still see oil slicks and its resultant damage. Where's the oil coming from?

Seeps.

A seep occurs when oil escapes naturally from the ground, due to pressure in the underground reservoir. Off the California coast, seeps release an incredibly large amount of oil. In fact, since the 1969 accident, the amount of such seepage in the Santa Barbara Channel alone has been over 30 times as large as the amount from the spill itself.

We can't stop such seeps, but we can reduce them. How? By drilling.

Earlier this year, University of California geophysics professor Bruce Luyendyk spoke to a citizens’ town hall forum at Santa Barbara. He told citizens that the oil mucking up Santa Barbara beaches was due to seeps, not spills. According to Luyendyk, the amount of oil escaping naturally from just one set of seeps in the Santa Barbara channel is equal to about 42 thousand gallons a day -- equal to an Exxon Valdez-size oil spill every 5 or 6 years.

Oil isn't the only thing seeping either. About 3 million cubic feet of natural gas escape each day from the ocean floor off the California Coast. By comparison, your average home uses between 200 and 300 cubic feet per day.

This is oil and gas we could be capturing and using. Instead, it's going to waste and polluting beaches in the process.

The sheer size of the seepage has led to the formation of a new environmental group, called SOS California -- which stands for Stop Oil Seeps. The group wants to lift the offshore drilling ban not to generate oil, but to reduce oil pollution from seepage. They point to university studies which demonstrate that extracting oil through drilling reduces reservoir pressure. That, in turn, reduces seepage. SOS advocates lifting the drilling ban for just that reason -- to reduce oil pollution on local beaches.

The Outer Continental Shelf is rich in oil. According to the US DOE, areas now off limits to drilling hold around 18 billion barrels. Other estimates are higher. Alaska's ANWR holds an additional 10 billion barrels. Together, that's enough to cut our foreign oil imports by 20% for the next 32 years, and generate $3.5 trillion in revenue. That's trillion, with a "T".

Polls show overwhelming support among Americans to lift the drilling ban. But is Washington listening? At the Democratic convention this week in Denver, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi stopped to tell a group protesting the drilling ban, "can we drill your heads"? At the national level, the message doesn't seem to be getting through.

The Santa Barbara City Council recently voted to lift their local ban on drilling, a largely symbolic act since state and federal laws still prohibit it. It's a start.

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Pulled from the soscalifornia website. Yeah, it may seem a bit sketchy, but frequently, people who present ideas like this in such an organized manner are people who have a stake and / or a bit of experience in it.

Reality isn't pretty, but at the end of the day, what matters most is that the job gets done. I think the fact that this information is openly disclosed on their website is good.

Nuclear power has the same issue. Often the proponents of it, or at least the most articulate ones, have worked in the domain, and have links with the industry. Or at least most of the most qualified are in this situation.

However, that does not prevent us to be on the cautious side when conflicts of interest are clearly a possibility.

quote: A conflict of interest only applies to a person with fiduciary, managerial, or legal authority over a matter, which doesn't seem to apply in this case.

I think that's because you take the legal definition (which was not my point). I guess the expression exists also in the common language, and is much less restrictive as far as I know. If I take that one:A conflict between a person's private interests and public obligations.

There is a possible conflict of interest between the publicly declared goal of the association (which seems to be solely to decrease the pollution) and the personal gains that some members could obtain.

However, English being not my native language, I may misinterpret the full extent of this expression.

If I reformulate as: there is a possibility that they could be biased/subjective because of their private interests in the matter, would that make it less problematic?

quote: I'm not quite sure what your problem is. Do you deny that natural seeps are occurring, or that we can't reduce them via drilling?

As for my problem here, I don't really have one with the science as I said before. However, I don't like too much when people with possible financial interests enter scientific and political debates, whether they are in the business of carbon trading or the offshore oil drilling equipments. And I guess it is always better when these issues are disclosed.

Again, knowing little about that particular subject, and considering that there is no reason why Bruce Luyendyk would have private interests in the matter (as he is a university professor I guess), I have no problem with the message itself (i.e. drilling for easing the pollution). However, on your article itself, I must say I am skeptical on the impact on the foreign oil import you've reported. But that's another story and it is not supposed to be the main point of the article anyway.

quote: I don't really have one with the science as I said before. However, I don't like too much when people with possible financial interests enter scientific and political debates

Funny you never seem to mind when wind or solar advocates do just the same.

Just today DT has a story on T.Boone Pickens begging for government to fund wind power: something he has a multi-billion dollar investment in. A more clear conflict of interest couldn't possibly exist. Where's your outrage there?

The best part about the T.Boone plan is that every resident in Texas will see an average $4 increase per month on their electric bill just to pay for the lines to connect his windfarm to the grid.

This of course is on top of the subsidies and tax breaks that he gets from the fed. Then he makes money off of selling the power itself. One story estimated that he might be able to pay the entire grid off in the first year of operation.

Capitalize on something people think they want, get them to pay for it and get even richer in the process. The guy is a genius. It's no wonder so few people are truly and royally rich. /sarcasm

quote: However, I don't like too much when people with possible financial interests enter scientific and political debates, whether they are in the business of carbon trading or the offshore oil drilling equipments.

Have you worked a day in your life, and then set aside or had set aside for you any of that money in either a self directed retirement account or a pension fund?

If no, then I'd doubt such a persons credibility as they must be all of 12 years old, and if yes, then they have financial ties to the oil industry. Oil companies make up components of both the DJIA and S&P500, and thus virtually everyone has part of their retirement coin on the line. This point has been made before, worth making it again.

Regardless of that, I don't see what the problem is with such people entering debates. Disregarding their opinion is disregarding the opinion of people who understand the business, have real-world operating knowledge of it, and perhaps best know how to change it or achieve whatever goal it is that society is looking for. I for one tend to consider such peoples word more highly than PhD's speaking from up high in their tenured academic ivory tower, who have little to no experience of whats going on in the real world. Clearly, some people from inside an industry may have bias, but to believe academics don't have their own equally strong political bias, that would be lunacy.

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